This article is taken from the blog of Rajkumar Mahendran “The Vast Nothing ” He is a 24 year old, Mechanical Engineer by profession. Reposting his blog as it may be useful for those wanting to understand this craft. I certainly did enjoy. Please click on the link below 🙂

Diwali is one of the major festivals of India. We will try and help you figure out how to shoot and what to shoot this Diwali.

Shoot macros

Shoot long exposures

Shoot candids.

A few things to keep in mind and we are sure you will have some really stunning results.

* Have a sturdy tripod. It does not matter if you have a simple one, but it should be in accordance with the camera and lenses you use. A big camera with heavy lenses needs a professional series. But a tripod is a must for all night photography i.e low light situations and long exposure shots ( fireworks, Car trails )

* Wear comfortable cotton or natural fibre clothes to prevent any mishap. Make necessary arrangements such as one person to cover you if possible while you make your shots and look after your personal belongings.

* A zoom lens if possible to capture fireworks from a distant.

* Switch the lens to manual focus & set a relatively narrow aperture specially during low light to get good focused shots.

* A lens hood is advised while you shoot as it cuts the ambient light thats may cause flares in your shots.

* a cable release or camera on self-timer is advised when taking long exposure shots of fireworks. If you own a DSLR, you should try locking the mirror to prevent any shake.

* Try to go close. Shoot some diya formations. Try capturing the beautiful rangolis that people make outside their homes.

*If shooting people, avoid shooting random people without their permission. You may like the bangles on a girls wrist or diya’s in her hand. Always take permission before taking a picture. It goes to show that you respect their privacy and are sensitive to it.

These are some very simple basic points. We will be posting more on a regular basis.

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Shared by http://www.stockimagebank.com – The Premium Indian Stock Photography site that is enabling and enriching the photographers to understand the commercial aspect and monetize their works.

They say “an image is worth a 1000 words”. I couldn’t agree more. I recently saw an image that pierced me in places I didn’t know existed. It was a picture of a frail old man, a panhandler, standing with a stick for support in one hand and a begging bowl in the other. His head hung extremely low and the people around him in the photograph just seem to walk on past him. Was he invisible to them? My heart just broke.

I wondered. What really is the purpose of this image or images in general?

It is my belief that the purpose of an image then is to be evocative, to haunt you with the unspoken, to alter your state of mind for a brief moment, to transport you to places, to make you wonder, to give you a glimpse of someone else’s life, to capture a fleeting moment, to inspire, to tell a story … the list is endless. Whether you are a hobbyist or a professional photographer, each capture is a once in a lifetime event.

But then how does one distinguish good photography from bad? Coming back to the old man narrative in the preceding section, what I didn’t mention then was the fact that this image was black and white. It was dramatic; it had an arresting center of interest (the subject), the lighting albeit natural – set the right mood and had a strong impact. If the same image was in colour, I believe it would have lost almost all those qualities.

There are certain key elements in good photography in any genre of the art form whether it is stock photography, street photography, nature photography, so on and so forth.

6. Steering away from the obvious – No one wants to see clichéd pictures of sunsets and tourist attractions! Step out of your comfort zone and challenge yourself to see what no one else does! Do not overlook tiny details.

One can write endlessly about the zillion technicalities involved in image making but to me “the” most important element in good photography is that individual’s vision behind the camera lens.

All you really need is your imagination and curiosity to set you apart from the crowd. How far are you willing to go to tell your soul stirring story?

Article Credit : Udita SinghUdita is a dreamer. She works in the creative department at http://www.StockImageBank.com. A cheerful, bright spot that she is, she is very observant. This ability has created a very honest expression of her point of view on images and photography. We though it was worth sharing with all of you ! Hope it changes the way you look at the image.

This is a conversation started by Sugandha Dubey on FB. Saturation versus over-saturation of digital photographs.

Sugandha Dubey I see a lot of images everyday. I speak to few photographers too. I have a question that I would like to put up here.
I hope I get some interesting answers to my very basic ” duh sounding” query.
Why do you like to over-saturate your images ?

Udit KulshresthaSugandha : Compare an image shot on velvia film and digitally saturated. Velvia will still appear with more saturation…

Ankit Narang Mam as in this digital age there are lots of amateur photographers and they don’t actually know, that to what extent the saturation should be pumped up so that the colors wont bleed out . Plus as majority of these photographers use non calibrated monitors . It looks fine on their screen but actually it is over saturated.

Monica Dawar I guess photographers do it bcoz they believe for the purpose of printing photograph is processed normally but for the purpose of online exhibit over-saturation is required!

Justin Rabindra Good question. I tended to do that (loved the artificially richer colours), though now I’ve started to control myself (I think.)

Sugandha Dubey Interesting feedback so far… if this goes well I may carry a post on our blog with credits to each one of u

Sanjay Nanda 1 images shot in raw are usually flat, so saturation needs to be bumped up to normal levels. 2 images shot in jpg are automatically saturated by the camera processor. 3 most amateur photographers usually over boost the saturation for a more impactful image. 4 all new flatscreen monitors are backlit and come callibrated at 9600K, so diaplay images more brightly than normal, making the image look saturated.

Himanshu Sharma I understand where this question comes from. I myself see a lot of oversaturation done on a lot of amateurish images. I myself shoot a lot in Raw format. Raw images are flat, and it depends solely on the editor to turn it into something he/she desires. Saturation is something which attracts the eye ( well to some ), but to an extent. what might look as saturation, might as well be lowered highlights, or darker shadows, or just lowered luminance of the colors. A lot of parameters go into editing these images. Its all in the perspective. Do i, as a photographer want people to see what they already see through naked eyes, or do i want to portray what might be more dreamy, more appealing. HDR photography is another example. Some people love it, a lot dont. It feels so unreal, yet so desirable at times. One perfect example of playing with saturation can be of ashot i clicked few days ago. it was of a sunset/ twilight period. Through naked eyes i could not see magenta/purple colors in the clouds. But saturating those colors itself i was amazed with the results. They infact were present in the raw image, right around the extreme edges of the cloud formation. I might have been random in my thoughts here, but i feel its solely on the perspective. Over saturation in most images is an overkill, but it might bring wonders to an image in certain scenarios.

Udit Kulshrestha Front lit images are contrasty and saturated more than the rest. Principles of light say so.

Himanshu Sharma Another rookie mistake most of us make, is to saturate the entire image, than to saturate the colors independently which need it.

Ravi Dhingra If we are talking of digital art and not photography in its pure form, oversaturation may work.

Akshat Jain Good question Sugandha
A quick tip for fellow photographers: Try to increase the ‘Vibrance’ instead of Saturation in PS or Lightroom.

Sugandha Dubey Thank you Gentlemen. It is a pleasure reading the replies. I am sure there are others too who read it
Can I also request Aditya AryaDinesh Khanna and Ashish Chawla , Samar S Jodha to give their perspective as well ? Would be nice. Also if we have any body from print experience background in this group may be they would like to shed some light how over saturation impacts printing quality ?

Akshat Jain If one is using a colour managed system, there is almost no difference in what you see on screen and in print.
Another tip: While saving photographs to be uploaded on web, use Save for Web & Devices (Alt + Shift + Ctrl + S) in PS, tick convert to sRGB, embed colour profile, optimized and change the quality and image size as required.

Dinesh Khanna I think most of the points one would make have already been made here. The problem, if one can call it that, lies in the amount, and more importantly, the ease of control available to the photographer to work on the image after its been shot. Saturation and sharpening are the 2 things people tend to overdo while using the sliders.

Sanjay Nanda dont agree with akshat. a CMS does help, but an image displayed on screen does not necessarily have to match the image on print, especially over-saturated colours. it is always the saturated colours that are out of gamut for most output devices. most pros process images in aRGB, the gamut of a high end image printer is even smaller than sRGB and the CMYK gamut is way smaller. also most people cannot view the saturated colours on their browsers accurately, the limitation being the gamut of the monitor, OS, browser and website. so all details in the saturated colours is lost and the saturated areas look flat.

Dinesh Khanna I am so glad I dont know a lot of the stuff some of the people are talking about here . . .

Samar S Jodha Dont know what to say here, As Dinesh Khanna said most has been spoken out here. I am still a sucker for my 4×5 film..or the iphone.

Dinesh Khanna Samar even I shoot incessantly with my iPhone. Almost everything I post on fb is with the phone camera and I love the spontaneity and immediacy it allows.
And I find that I use my dslr only for assignments and long term projects like Mothers & Daughters’ and Benaras.
The 4×5, unfortunately, is now just a much loved but distant dream.

Jasminder Oberoi Masters have already spoken about it in detail. As per my limited understanding, first they over saturate may be because they like it that way; second reason could be since they have that liking of colors, they do not know where to draw the line. I being a sucker for colors, never knew where to stop and almost always went overboard myself. The monitor calibration also adds to their woes. Some have shunned Vibrance as a bad option but to the best my understanding Vibrance is a better choice for fashion oriented images and saturation (using selective colors and layers) is a better option for almost all other kinds of images.

Akshat Jain You mentioned that Increasing “Vibrance” is better. Udit Kulshrestha You said it is not. Now we need a tie breaker ?? Anyone ?

Himanshu Sharma Vibrance often affects only colors which might appear milder and most of the time does not affect colors which are already saturated to a point. Saturation on the other hand, increases the color intensity irrespective of what they already are.
i prefer vibrance over saturation any day.

Sanjay Nanda vibrancy is just like saturation, but only a selective saturation booster. it effects only non-saturated colours but has no effect on skin tones. btw vibrance is an apple aperture option, not LR or PS.

Himanshu Sharma It sure is an option in Lightroom. have been using it for an year now.

Jasminder Oberoi Saturation bumps all the colors uniformally which means that if a color in an image is already little more saturated than others, it has high chance of looking bad (bleeding might also occur). Where as Vibrance just works on weaker colors leaving the already strong colors alone. It also does not make skin look un natural. IMO its a better option..

This brings it to the end of the such an informative and interesting conversation on the page of Delhi Photographers on FB. Thank you Monica and all the gentlemen who engaged. This is shared by www.stockimagebank.com to benefit people from advertising, art, students, photographers, professionals … anyone at large who will gain. If you have more perspective on the same please feel free to add here.

We also found a few more interesting links that may be useful and recommend to read.

This image of Marine Drive Mumbai, is shot by Kunal Gaikwad. Probably one of the most shot places in the world. It is also called the Queens Necklace, because of the beautiful road that curves and the row of street lights that give the illusion of a jewel studded necklace.

This is what Kunal had to say about how he took this image. ” I shot this during the blue hour on last Thursday. The sky was partially cloudy with a few bit of drizzles. When this shot was taken, the clouds had obscured the sky over the Queens Necklace and the land part, but left the sky clear above the water part. It has been shot on Nikon D7000, 18-55 mm lens, f/4, 1/6 sec (handheld), ISO 400. I enhanced the blues on the right and made it a little lighter.. decreased the shadows by adding graduated filter.”

Kunal is 25 year old and a budding lawyer working in a Law firm in Mumbai. He says that photography is just his hobby, and that he is no pro.

Like this:

Credit : Bhanuprakash Adhikarath , Bhanu is a renowned Indian ad filmaker . Posting series of ads he has created ( 2012, 13 ) for MALABAR GOLD AND DIAMONDS BRIDES OF INDIA 2013. AD FILM IN HINDI, MALAYALAM, TAMIL. TELUGU, AND KANNADA.

I personally found them beautifully executed, one because it evokes the emotion of the grand celebrations Indian marriage ceremonies are. Two, its perfect for the brand and the product. You do not miss the gold and jewellery that is such an integral part of indian marriages. @ Bahnu, you must share insights on what was the impact on sales and business for the client !